I haven't picked on the Northside Sun since I've started this blog. As I don't want anyone to think I discriminate, I found another gem in a recent issue I want to discuss.
Mr. Wyatt Emmerich, the publisher, penned an editorial where he strongly urged people to "shop local":
"Independent, privately-owned shops and businesses are the lifeblood of our country. This is where our employment growth is generated. The big corporate chains reduce people. The small companies hire people.Yet we flock like lemmings to the big box stores, falling for their feel-good TV ads while they trick us with loss-leader pricing.
I don’t eat at chains. Every restaurant I go to is locally owned. They’re better. They’re unique. They have heart and soul....
So don’t be so sure you are automatically getting the best price just because you walk into a cavernous store. Over time, the big chains naturally take on corporate overhead and become less efficient...." http://www.northsidesun.com/articles/2008/05/01/news/09.txt
Mr. Emmerich is very wrong if he thinks many of us shop at the "chains" because of price. McDade's is one example of why I shop at the dreaded "chains". There is a McDades exactly 200 yards from where I live. It is convenient. Unfortunately, there are a few things about it that force me to shop at Kroger. First of all, the prices are MUCH higher than at Kroger (I will keep it fair by not even comparing them to Wal-Mart). Second, the product selection at McDades is VERY poor. Most of the items I buy are not available at McDades. Angel hair whole wheat pasta? Dannon smoothies? Oatmeal raisin cookie dough (yeah, I like to bake cookies on a semi-regular basis)? Large size Bush's Chili? Oscar Myer Roast Beef sammich meat? Sun Maid Tropical Trio dried fruit? Lite & Low Sugar Eggo Syrup? Go to Kroger. Saturday I wanted to bake some chicken breasts. I was expecting the Sanderson Farms' packs I find at the chains. Instead of the large chicken breasts produced by Sanderson Farms, McDade's had some "family pack" of generic chicken that looked like it was that scrawny boxing chicken in Looney Toons. My newest addiction has been those Tyson whole chickens (already cooked) at Kroger. Yes, McDade's sells a whole chicken from their deli. A chicken that is bland and as dry as parts of Rankin County. Their ribs taste like shoe leather with some seasoning sprinkled on top of where the stitches are. They would be better off if they just copied Kroger and sold some Tyson and Sanderson Farms products. However, who am I to quibble with shopping local?
My gripe with shopping local does not stop at McDades. When I need something hardware related, I go to Ace Hardware in Maywood Mart first. Unfortunately, that usually means a second trip to Home Depot or Lowes because surprise, the local hardware store rarely has what I need. Or they are closed. Needed some hardware today. Were they open? Nope. Went to a chain. Price had nothing to do with it. I was looking for Weber gas grills two weeks ago. Home Depot had them already assembled. Ace told me they could order it for me and it would be in in a few days. Anyone want to bet I would have to go back up there and get it instead of their delivering it to my door?
Then there is the owner of LeMuria. Since the early 90's, I have read his incessant whining in the newspaper over how much he has been hurt by the "chains". Well Mr. Lemuria, I am your ideal customer. I rarely buy best-sellers. When I purchase a book, price is almost never a factor to me. I have 30 boxes of books in in library, mostly hardback. Want to know why I rarely purchased a book at your store? For years Lemuria kept bankers hours. Unfortunately some of us can't buy a book until 7:00PM or later, sometimes much later. The main reason I've gone to Barnes and Noble or Borders over the years has been the fact that their store hours fit perfectly into my schedule AND they had a very large inventory.
For years, Lemuria was not open on Sundays and for only a few hours on Saturday. If you wanted to go book-shopping after dinner, sorry, you were out of luck. Fortunately Lemuria has changed its ways and has hours that are much more convenient. Wanted an expresso to drink while you read a novel? For a long time, you had to go to a chain as they were the first in Jackson to place cafes in bookstores while Lemuria did not do so. After awhile, buying local is harder to do when the convenience and other factors besides price are titled heavily in favor of the hated chains. However, it must be noted that now Lemuria is much more competitive and convenient than it used to be (And by the way, I've been a VERY good customer of Choctaw Books for years in case anyone thinks I have a bias towards chains).
The point of all of this personal griping is that there are many other reasons why many of us shop at the chains and avoid shopping "local" and most of the time, price is rarely a factor. If local stores want our business, then perhaps they should be open when it is convenient for us, not for them. Perhaps they should have websites where we can actually check inventory and compare items. It would help if they had inventory that actually fit our needs. Sorry, but why should I order an item and wait a whole week for it when I drive a few miles and take it home that same day? At some point we get tired of coming to your "local" store and then going to a chain because once again you didn't have something we need. If you don't have convenient store hours, offer good service and support, and have what we need when we actually need it, don't complain when the so-called chains get our business.
Kingfish note: Don't even get me started on Cowboy Maloney's and why I don't shop there anymore. The last two times I bought something there they couldn't do ANYTHING right.
Sunday, May 11, 2008
Shop local?
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9 comments:
I'm pretty much exclusively a McDade's guy--you'll find me at Kroger's every now and then, not real often--and I don't fault McDade's for anything because I know grocery stores operate within a very tight profit margin, but I'm in sympathy with a lot of what you write here. When shopping local costs more and means a smaller inventory and fewer perks, it becomes a luxury.
Luxuries are things that wealthy people can afford. So you end up with one more case where the right thing to do also happens to be the thing that only people of a certain income bracket can afford to do. It becomes a status symbol--yuppie chic. (See also: Buying produce at the farmer's market vs. buying it at the grocery store. Or buying free range chicken. Or buying fair trade coffee.)
This sidesteps the benefits of chains, which do exist--working conditions are sometimes more equitable at chains, and bulk purchasing is much more environmentally friendly than small-volume purchasing.
I believe in buying local when I can, but I feel absolutely no guilt when the local option is more expensive, less convenient, or otherwise offers an inferior experience to a chain.
Re Choctaw, I worked at the first edition room for a few years in the late 1990s myself. Fred's a good guy!
Then there is Cowboy Maloneys. Last two items I bought from them: A Maytag dryer and a Carrier AC unit. Both had to be returned and the dryer was delivered and did NOT work at all when hooked up. They handled the delivery and installation. Delivery times were completely screwed up. Several months after the purchase of the dryer, I kept getting bills from them saying I owed them for the dryer and washer I bought from them even though I had paid them when I bought them AND had the cancelled check to prove it. After awhile you say enough. Never had these problems at Best Buy.
And it has nothing to do with price whatsoever.
and as I said, if they are not open when I need something, tough luck.
I view McDade's more like a quick shop than a true grocery store. If you go in there looking for anything other than the basics, you're going to be disapointed. It's great when you need a basic item on the way home, but little more than that.
On hardware stores, I've never had luck at Ace at Maywood, but Montgomery Hardware next to the hippy grocery are the champs. You're not going to get the best price, and something simple like a gas grill, absolutely go to HD. However, if you need help with something you're working on OR need a small part, but not sure what it is, the help Montgomery gives you is worth the price difference. GOOD LUCK finding any help at the Home Despot.
Lemuria: no customrer service - don't feel guilty ignoring them for the chains.
I were one of the McDade's, I would take that Maywood Mart store and make it a gourmet grocery store. Maxwell's in Baton Rouge is a good example. Have a high end deli that sells cheese and pastries (like Martins Wine Cellar in New Orleans on Vets) Sell higher end meats with a real meat and seafood counter. There is no whole foods here in Jackson so create a mini version of them. As I worked in grocery stores for 7 years while in high school and college, I might actually know what I am talking about. The nice thing about a gourmet grocery store is the profit margins are going to be higher and that location would already have the wine next door.
I'm enjoying this comment string...I'm in McDades almost every day and agree that they don't have everything......but they have most everything to keep me happy. (My wife goes to Kroger for the heavy duty shopping). However, if I can stock up on coffee for me and dog food for the Bulldog.....we're smiling.
Bring in the Tyson cooked chickens. I can eat those all day. the ones out of their deli aren't even good for a jambalaya or fish bait.
I still think there is a place for a gourmet grocery store. And MM loacation is ideal for it as it is next to interstate and would pull in some madison and ridgeland traffic. At Maxwells people come in just to buy their marinated beef kabobs. They have like 7 differentn types. You get the idea.
I dunno... McDade's has almost everything I need most of the time, and I shop for some pretty crazy stuff sometimes. Hummus, Kavli crispbread, low-fat ramen noodles, palak paneer, falafel mix, light soymilk, kefir... They've also special-ordered a few things for me. Kroger's has a better selection, but it's also huge.
The gourmet shop sounds like a good idea except that the gourmet section at the McDade's 14 already tends to expire stuff before it sells, and given the price of those items, I imagine that can really hurt profits. What I think would really help McDade's is a greater emphasis on relatively nonperishable gourmet goods--stuff that'll keep at least six months.
I don't know about the food selection of McDade's, but the beer selection is the best I've found in the area. Since the Kroger in Dogwood stopped carrying Newcastle 12-packs a few weeks ago, I have been driving 20 minutes from Rankin County to get to the Northside location just to buy beer. If there is a better place for imported beer, please let me know, because I haven't seen it since I moved here a year ago.
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